The Orchid Mind: Cultivating the Ideal Conditions for Your Nature (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781067612139)

Some people become more sensitive not because they were born that way - but because of what life has asked of them.

The Orchid Mind is for anyone whose nervous system is currently running hot - whether that has always been true, or whether life has brought you to a more vulnerable place. This book can be found on a therapist's bookshelf and on a bedside table.

Drawing on twenty years of clinical practice as a CBT therapist and counselling psychologist, Sandra Zecevic-Gonzalez introduces the orchid/dandelion framework: the research-backed idea - familiar to readers of the highly sensitive person literature - that some nervous systems are exquisitely sensitive to their environment, more harmed by poor conditions, but also more enhanced by good ones. Crucially, this is not a fixed identity. It is a state. And states can change.

The framework draws on peer-reviewed research across developmental psychology, neuroscience, CBT and the emerging evidence base for creative health - and is designed to be genuinely used, not just read.

The Orchid Mind offers a complete, practical framework for understanding and cultivating the conditions in which you flourish:

• Understand exactly why you feel what you feel - and what your inner world actually needs, by mapping your inner conditions (core beliefs, thinking patterns, nervous system, values) and your outer conditions (relationships, work, physical environment, creative life)
• Use evidence-based tools from CBT, compassion-focused therapy and mindfulness - practical techniques you can apply immediately, without a therapist in the room
• Build a sustainable creative practice - the one condition most self-help books overlook
• Know when professional support is the right next step - and how to find the right fit when it is

This is not a book about becoming less sensitive. It is a book about building the conditions in which your sensitivity becomes an asset.

The practical next step for readers of Elaine Aron's The Highly Sensitive Person, Susan Cain's Quiet, Johann Hari's Lost Connections, Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way and Emily Nagoski's Burnout.

Especially suitable for general readers and a valuable resource for therapists, counsellors and mental health practitioners.